Downing Street Says » UN/Food and Agriculture Organisation Summit

» Tuesday, June 3, 2008

UN/Food and Agriculture Organisation Summit

Asked if Douglas Alexander would walk out if Robert Mugabe made a speech at the UN/FAO summit, the PMS said that it was best to double check with Douglas Alexander’s spokesman who was with him, as he could relay the expected timetable for the day. However, our expectation was that Douglas Alexander would not be in the room if Mr Mugabe were to give a speech.

Asked if Douglas Alexander would vacate the room in advance of Mr Mugabe making a speech or if he would walk out while Mr Mugabe was making his speech, the PMS said that it was best to check with people from Douglas Alexander’s office, however we did not anticipate that Douglas Alexander would be in the room if Mr Mugabe started giving a speech.

Asked about Robert Mugabe’s knighthood, the PMS replied that Mr Mugabe had an honorary knighthood and that this was something that we had kept and would continue to keep under review; the key point was that we did not want to do anything that distracted people from the very difficult situation currently faced by the people of Zimbabwe and that all of our efforts would be focused on what more we could do to improve their plight.

Put that it could be counter-productive to challenge the knighthood, the PMS repeated that this was a situation we kept under review and that there were arguments for and against the knighthood, however, the key focus should be on what we could do to relieve the very difficult humanitarian situation in Zimbabwe.

No Comments »

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Post a public comment

Name (required)
E-mail (required)
(You must give an email address, but it will not be displayed to the public.)
Website
(You may give your website, and it will be displayed to the public.)

Comments:

This is not a way of contacting the Prime Minister. If you would like to contact the Prime Minister, go to the 10 Downing Street official site.

Privacy note: Shortly after posting, your name and comment will be displayed on the site. This means that people searching for your name on the Internet will be able to find and read your comment.

Original PMOS briefings are © Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Click-use licence number C02W0004089. Material is reproduced from the original 10 Downing Street source, but may not be the most up-to-date version of the briefings, which might be revised at the original source. Users should check with the original source in case of revisions. Comments are © Copyright contributors. Everything else is © Copyright Downing Street Says.